We are hearing from legislators that they are concerned by the number of psychologists calling in opposition to SB 2187. Please make some time to give your Representative(s) another call in the Springfield office today or early next week. They will be in Springfield every weekday until they adjourn for the summer.

If you have social worker, counselor, or nurse colleagues who are supportive of SB 2187 or have neighbors or friends who are supportive and have not called yet, please ask them to do so also. We need to keep making the point that many more psychologists and associated professionals and citizens are supportive of SB 2187 than are opposed.

The biggest scam going in mental health is poor people having their kids diagnosed so that they can get on social security. Of course the kids are taking anti-psychotics that are prescribed. Now, we want to make it easier for the scam to be perpetrated?

I am a psychologist who thinks that abbreviated training to prescribe and attempt to manage powerful medications is unwise. Get fuller medical or advanced practice nursing education if you are a psychologist who wants to prescribe. If prescribing were such a major goal for somebody, they should have pursued those training pathways that focus on pharmacological approaches to start with.

The vast majority of psychologists oppose what’s in this bill because it’s unsafe. This is a campaign run by a small group that wants to expand their market share and they are supported by private schools that can profit from this bill.

Look at the bill and it even provides some sugar for the Illinois Psychological Association, which is funding this with an account whose donor list is secret. It says the prescribers will have to buy some of their continuing education credits from that organization.

There are a number of medical schools that prefer non-traditional students (i.e. students who have had previous careers and life experience). Rush in particular would love to have more psychologists apply. ‘Course as referenced above that would involve 4 years of medical school and at least 3 years of residency training…

“The biggest scam going in mental health is poor people having their kids diagnosed so that they can get on social security. Of course the kids are taking anti-psychotics that are prescribed. Now, we want to make it easier for the scam to be perpetrated?”

Not true - whether or not someone has been prescribed medications for mental impairment has absolutely nothing to do with qualifying for SSI. In fact, the Social Security Administration’s requirements for a child to qualify for SSI are very specific; they include a lot of criteria, but the fact that a therapist has given a child a prescription is not one of them.
By the way, I do oppose this bill for the reasons others have stated - lack of adequate training and because it’s not difficult for people who need such prescriptions to get them now. But if it does pass it wouldn’t have any effect on children qualifying for SSI.